Saturday AM Featured Speakers 2017

CLICK ON THE NAME FOR PHOTO & BIO OF EACH SPEAKER
Simultaneous breakout sessions will be presented. You will have multiple choices.(All of these sessions will fulfill the requirements for Nebraska Department of Health and Human Services and Rule 11.)

JANE FLEMINGMaking “tough stuff” Typical: Using Children’s Literature to Navigate the Realities of Modern Life (Part III)Explore a range of quality picture books that can help initiate everyday conversations about the realities of children’s lives, including family diversity, economic challenges, and separation or loss.
When classroom collections include books that mirror children’s experience, they can see that they are included and valued in the life of school. Unfortunately, teachers, parents and other caregivers sometimes shy away from the use of “mirrors” that accurately reflect what they may view as “tough stuff” in children’s lives, such as economic insecurity, separation or loss, or nontraditional family structures. For many children, on the other hand, this is just real life. This session is designed to familiarize participants with high-quality contemporary children’s literature that can help initiate developmentally appropriate conversations about the diversity of experiences in children’s lives and can support all children in better understanding our diverse modern world.

This presentation will be based on the work of Nancy Telian, developer of the evidence-based program, Lively Letters.

PATRICIA MAHRT-ROBERTSBabies: Learning to Read the WorldHigh-quality early relationships and experiences throughout the child’s day provide infants and toddlers with the tools for early language and literacy skills and future school success. This interactive session will include rationale, examples, practical strategies, and tips for promoting literacy skills with infants and toddlers.

MICHELLE L. RUPIPERBuilding a Rich Vocabulary through Literature and Classroom ActivitiesChildren’s oral language is crucial to their academic success. By the time a child enters kindergarten children from advantaged homes may know as many as 15,000 more words than their less advantaged peers. This session will provide strategies to help children build a rich vocabulary through the use of good literature and classroom activities.

NANCY CHRISTENSENThe Nuts and Bolts of a Writing Workshop for Young WritersIn this session, participants will receive an overview of the architecture of a Writing Workshop. The session will enable teachers to see the many possibilities for powerful Mini Lessons with the use of children’s literature as mentor texts. Practical tips and language for planning and delivering effective Mini Lessons will be shared. The power of writing is a gift for all students. Teachers will be empowered to offer the setting of a Writing Workshop inside their classroom.

Conferring with Young Writers in a Writing WorkshopIn this session, participants will view the structure of effective one-to-one writing conferences. Writing conferences are the heart of teaching writing. Teachers will learn powerful language to use when talking with and providing feedback to students. A “Conferring Toolkit” will be demonstrated in order for teachers to design their own for classroom use. Practical tips of managing daily conferences in a Writing Workshop will be shared in order for teachers to grow strong writers.

Virtually no parent believes his child will drop out of high school, and nearly 70 percent expect their children to earn a bachelor's or professional degree in college. Those results are part of a first look at data released this morning from the 2016 federal Parent and Family Involvement in Education Survey, a nationally representative […]

Preschool instructors appear to lack the knowledge, skills and confidence to effectively teach their young students science – a problem that is likely contributing to America’s poor global performance in this crucially important subject. A first-of-its-kind study by Michigan State University researchers found that early childhood educators’ self-reported ability and enjoyment was high for literacy, […]

This week is Banned Books Week, the week we celebrate having the freedom to read whatever we want. Did you know that even children’s books are challenged sometimes? It’s true. You might wonder why anyone would try to ban a picture book or a young adult novel. It turns out that there are a whole […]